Too Many Possibilities
by Buffintruda
Summary: After the Battle of the Five Armies, Tauriel reflects.


**A/N: This is dedicated to Gingehfish. Without you, I wouldn't have read this pairing, much less written it. Happy New Years!**

Tauriel didn't fully love him. At least, not in the way of life long friends, or married folk with decades or centuries or millennia behind them, or tightly bonded siblings who remained close for their entire lives. Not in the kind of way that took ages to form, where each person came to know all of the other's strengths and flaws and loved the person still. Not in the way that involves countless memories and knowing the other person like one knew themself, and adjusting and compromising and shaping to form something that would last.

Her love had been far too short lived for that. She had loved fiercely and passionately, ready to kill and die and leave everything she knew behind for the sake of one dwarf. But in the end that had not been enough to save his life. And when Kili died, so did the chance of the more lasting kind of love.

But just because the way they had loved each other had not been the kind formed after years, did not mean it was any less real. What defined love? Was it knowing the world was a better place with another person in it than it was without them, knowing that _you_ were a better person with them in your life? Was it willingness to put their happiness and well being over yours? Was it being able to trust another so completely, or the ability to be truly yourself around that person, no masks or secrets? Was it wanting your home, a place of safety and warmth, to be with that person? She had felt all of that. The other kind of love was a love filled with certainties. The one Tauriel had was a love filled with possibilities. As different as each was from the other, both were just as true and meaningful.

She had never had the opportunity to get to know him completely, to love him in the long term relationship sense. Now she never would. There were so many things that could have happened. Perhaps their relationship would not have worked out. Maybe after some time together, they would have realized they were too different, or there might have been too many problems with centuries of strife between their species, or a thousand other things that could have gone wrong. But it also could have gone right. They could have spent the rest of his much shorter life together, happy and content. They could have tied their races closer together and help bring in more peaceful times. They could have done so many things that Tauriel couldn't even imagine now. And yes, Kili was mortal. He would have died eventually, but it wouldn't have been _now._ They would have had more time.

None of those possibilities could happen now, but to Tauriel, that didn't make them matter less. She grieved for what might have been and the countless futures that now could never be.

It made her angry, knowing that she could never learn all that they could have done together if only given the chance. She could never learn if they would have lasted. She could never find out if Kili's family would have accepted her. She could never see if Thranduil would have been as apologetic if he hadn't come across her weeping over her loved one's dead body, or how Kili would help in restoring his kingdom, or a million other things. It frustrated her beyond end that she would never get to _know_ what would have happened if Kili had survived. She could imagine everything for all of eternity, but the only reality she could ever experience was this one.

Was it worse losing someone who had been in your life as long as you could remember, knowing all the things that could now never happen, or losing someone who you had just met, now never being able to know what you were losing?

In a way, Tauriel was losing both: Kili, who she had known for too short of a time, and Greenwood, with everything that included - Legolas, Thranduil, all of her friends and acquaintances, and the forest in which she had lived her whole life - all of that combining into a place she had once called home. The love she had for that place was a more familiar type, not ever having felt intense or powerful or even really present until now, when it was all gone.

It wasn't fully gone, not in the way Kili was. It consisted of too many things to be easily wiped out. Many people she knew were lost in the battle, but not all. Legolas and Thranduil weren't. The forest itself was not. But Legolas had left and Thranduil, though both had forgiven each other in many ways, was not entirely happy with her yet, nor she with him. Tauriel was not certain if she was still banished from Mirkwood, but thought it better to not return. It wouldn't be the same anyway, with all that had changed. And so it was gone to her.

The pain for the loss of her former life wasn't as bad as it could have been. Even if things had drastically changed in the past week, her old home and many people she cared about still existed and she could see them if she wanted to. She didn't want to yet, but just that she _could_ was some comfort.

But although it was not as painful as Kili's death, it was more shaking. It was all she had ever known, everything reliable and routine, now gone. She didn't know what to do with herself or where to go or what happened next. And that was terrifying. She was on her own in a way she had never been before. There were no orders from her king, no friends or fellow warriors to advise her against any stupid actions or to just be there by her side, offering her their companionship.

Going against Thranduil's commands, rebelling against him so blatantly and openly, had been the first time she had done something like that. At least then, her love for Kili and the world she lived in fueled a righteous fury, and both times, Legolas had joined her soon after.

Now, she had no one, no raging emotions to motivate her to fight for her beliefs and the things she cared about. There was nothing left to fight anymore.

Tauriel had always considered herself independent, and maybe she had been, but she had never realized how much of her strength depended on others until now when she was on her own.

There was nothing left for her here now. She had to find her own purpose, make her own future. If only she knew where to start. There were all at once too few and too many possibilities.


End file.
